Call it the widget revolution. Mac OS X, Windows and Linux all have
widgets for pulling in available content from small software houses and
other sources around the Internet.

Although users can cull these free bits of data from elsewhere on the
Web, the widget, thanks to Apple, has become a major element for the
marketing associated with the operating system itself.

In many ways, promoting the use of these widgets is similar to car
companies that run commercials about a new OnStar feature or satellite
radio rather than about the power train or engineering innovations of
the car itself.

Decreasing emphasis on the chassis of an operating system and
focusing more on its widget-like features is indicative of the
direction that OS vendors are going, say many analysts. The increasing
homogenization among operating systems means that the future of the OS
might just be about content.

Free Stuff

To extend the car analogy a bit further, one of the reasons that
widgets are important is because operating systems have started to look
very much alike. Much as most cars of a certain price range have
basically the same power under the hood, so too have operating systems
begun to have similar capabilities.

"When operating systems began integrating features that were in
other systems, they were well on the road to becoming undifferentiated
from each other," said Ted Schadler, an analyst at Forrester Research.
"With widgets, they see an opportunity to win users by being unique in
how free content is pulled into the system."

Because operating systems are beginning to look interchangeable, the
free information represented by widgets and other content-distribution
methods becomes a way for vendors to differentiate their systems from
the competition.

Even if Linux, OS X and Windows can pull in the same kind of content
through widgets, the way that content is graphically presented might
just woo some users to switch from one system to another.

Apple Barrel

While both Windows and Linux systems offer widget-like
content-pulling technologies through various third-party software
providers, Apple has been keen to promote its built-in widgets and its
other content offerings.

Rather than telling customers that they should upgrade to Tiger
because they can take advantage of the stable, 64-bit Unix
implementation, Apple has been pitching its Dashboard feature, which
allows users to customize their widgets and download as many as they
like right from the Apple site.

Currently, Apple offers about 1,000 widgets that can keep users up
to date on everything from stock quotes to daily Tao wisdom. Recently,
the company added an Ask Jeeves (Nasdaq: ASKJ - news) widget that lets
users type in Web search questions from the Dashboard.

"Apple knows that even with this Intel chip switch, it's not going
to go around talking about chips and what's inside the box," said IDC
analyst Dan Kusnetzky. "The company builds on the differentiation it's
already found from its software, which combines with the design of the
machine."

That software includes widgets and dashboard elements, he added.
"There's certainly a play for style with Apple, and they're going to
use widgets for that," said Kusnetzky.

Content Push

Although systems now use these content-distribution strategies to be
unique, the pace of systems technology likely will turn widgets into
standard fare.

"To gain more users, an OS creator would have to generalize the
system, which is exactly what's happening," said Jared Spool, principal
of User Interface Engineering, a firm that has been testing online user
experience for the last decade.

"It's a march toward mediocrity," he said, "but that's a
decision these creators have to make if they want their systems to be
more widely used."

In time, it is possible that this content-pushing strategy will
meet a fate similar to other aspects of an operating system that once
were avidly promoted. With operating systems looking similar and OS
developers increasingly using free information as a draw, the age of
the widget as differentiator might very well be short-lived.

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